Easter Cupcakes

Not much to say about these. Cute, though, aren't they?
I made twelve egg cupcakes and the rest of the batch just got dollops of frosting. When I was doing the dollops, they looked amazingly like little piles of doggie doo. The little hearts and flowers helped reduce the excrement-ness...or made it look like the dog had had a very interesting meal. Your choice.
I've been attempting to improve my photography skills, and this week, I've discovered--gasp--wait for it--how to turn off the flash (work with me here people, I'm a musicologist, we're not so good with technology). It helped, don't you think?

I've also been trying to do that nifty thing where the front item is in focus and the ones behind are progressively fuzzier. This is the closest I got:
I want to eat that front one now, don't you? Now I just have to learn how to remove the cans of cat food from behind the picture before I snap it.

March Lions and Lambs

After several tries at copying the recipes out of my cupcake book, creativity has finally struck. I'd come across a neat blogger (http://bakerella.blogspot.com/) who had been creating something called "cake pops." Basically, cake pops are cake balls on sticks. Okay, what's a cake ball? Well, besides the source of many a sophomoric joke, cake balls are crumbled up cake mixed with frosting and dipped in candy melts. Bakerella decorates hers in all sorts of neat ways, so I decided to combine my enthusiasm for cupcake decorating with cake pops.

I made lions and lambs in honor of our lion-like entrance into March:

The best part about these is that the decorations are almost entirely of my own invention. I stole the lion's mane (which is my least favorite part, frankly) from the cupcake book, but everything else was my own. The lion's ears are created with chocolate chips stuck to the cake pop with frosting before dipping, and the pink insides are little hearts. The lamb's ears are Swedish fish stuck into the ball before dipping, with curled Twizzlers Pull-n-Peel for the inside of the ears. Noses are an M&M and half a Jelly Belly, respectively.

The rest of their faces are drawn on with my new toys: edible pens. I was stupidly excited about the idea of edible pen, but it practice, it didn't go so well. The candy started sweating fairly quickly and then the pens hardly worked. Next time I'll probably keep everything in the fridge while decorating.

They turned out pretty cute, and they were tasty, too. Hopefully none of my creations ever turn up on my other new favorite blog: http://cakewrecks.blogspot.com/

Butterfly in the sky

I can fly twice as high!

I had the Reading Rainbow theme song in my head all day yesterday as I made these. My mother chose these cupcakes out of the book at Christmastime, and didn't think I'd actually do them. Well, Mom underestimated me! Mom's birthday is on Wednesday, so the J crew (that's Jay, Josh, and Joanna) and I went up to mis padres for dinner last night, and the butterflies came along.

These are my favorite cupcakes so far. Not only are they completely vegetarian, but they turned out the closest to the book design. They were also very tasty--the last two designs were extremely sugary, but these, with dark chocolate cake and dark chocolate in the wings, were just right.

The wings are made of two different colors of candy melting wafers. The wafers are melted in ziplock bags and then dripped onto wax paper. This was certainly the hardest part. First of all, the book insists that it's easy to use ziplock bags for decorating (both for the wafers and for frosting designs). That is a load of horse hockey. The bags are far too flimsy and no matter how much tape I use to reinforce the seams, they constantly break apart. I've ended up covered in chocolate every time. So from now on, it's official cake decorating bags only for me.

The wings set really fast. Once I didn't even have time to sprinkle the nonpareils on before it had set. So that is one plus--the process moves fairly fast. 24 sets of wings took me about an hour, and probably would take half the time now that I've gotten the hang of it. The rest of the decorating is fairly simple. The wings are held up by M&Ms underneath:


Jay deserves an honorable mention for his involvement in the Butterfly Cupcakes. First of all, I sent him to the store twice: once for eggs, and once because I'd accidentally made the wrong kind of cake (it had pudding in it and the cupcakes blew up like muffins, impossible to frost). Then, as we were leaving the house with cupcakes in hand, he took a bad step and twisted his ankle horribly, but managed to save the cupcakes from certain death and dismemberment. His ankle blew up to the size of a baseball and he is hobbling around like an old man today.

I have no more cupcake plans for at least a month from now; so, if you are having a party, invite me, because I'm bringing cupcakes.

Little Effing Penguins

After a pretty crappy January, I've finally gotten around to making Cupcake Project Round Two. This time I picked penguins, since there's only a month left of winter (wahoo!), and I was making them for my friends Dylan and Mandy, who were having a party. For some reason, I felt Mandy would appreciate penguins.

Here is how they came out:

These were much easier than the dogs, mostly because I could assembly-line them. The most time-consuming part was creating the shape: they are made with a donut hole on top of half a mini donut on top of the cupcake. The whole thing is slathered with frosting to hold it together, then dipped in more frosting, which allows them the ability to give you diabetes immediately.

I made two versions. This is the vegetarian version, with gumdrops and Mamba candies:
And this is the original recipe, with marshmallows and Starburst:
The Mambas were a great replacement for the gelatin-laden Starburst, but the gumdrops didn't look as good as the marshmallow, since they're not as stark white. I'm still looking for some veggie marshmallows--our Whole Foods didn't have them. Also, the penguins were supposed to have Starburst feet, but I was too lazy, so I skipped that part. I'm also starting to hate those chocolate cookies--I ruined a bunch of flippers, and then they softened as the evening went on and fell off the penguins. However, they were much appreciated by the partygoers. Mandy kept saying, "they're little effing penguins!" Only she didn't really say effing, but you know.

Next installment of the Cupcake project coming soon!

Pup Cakes

For New Year's Eve, I took the opportunity to try my first batch of decorated cupcakes. I picked designs that didn't involve piping, since I don't feel too confident with that yet, but had multiple versions to try. The ingredients for the pup cakes were really easy to find, too. Here is how they came out:
From left to right: dalmation, chocolate lab, beagle, dachshund.

Sadly, the first three are not vegetarian, since their muzzles are made of marshmallow (underneath all that frosting). So I decided to make the dachshund also, which was the least cute in the book, but the only one without any marshmallow. He looks great in real life, though, and turned out to be my favorite.
The book (called Hello, Cupcake!) insists that all of the designs are easy enough for anyone. I agree that they were easy; however, they're very time-consuming. It took me three hours to make eight of them, though it was a fun three hours. Most of the time came from cutting the chocolate cookies (you can see the cookies on the dachshund's ears; they also make up all the dogs' mouths), and mixing frosting colors and loading bags. I couldn't find a good way to shape the cookies, which turned out to be the most annoying part. They tended to split in the wrong places. The book suggests popping them in the microwave for a couple of seconds to soften them, but that did nothing for me. The rest of the designs were easy. The ears for the beagle and lab are made of smooshed Tootsie Rolls, which was fun, and the pink tongues are squished Starburst.

I made two of each breed. Here is the whole dog park:
The book has a ton of really cute designs, so I hope you all like cupcakes, because that's what you're getting for your birthday!

Anniversary

For our anniversary, we went to Ten Tables in JP for dinner. I'd been wanted to try it for a long time and our two-year seemed like a perfect excuse. They have a vegetarian tasting menu every night, plus they serve homemade smoked meats and sausages and all the meat is from humanely treated animals. Tuesday is wine tasting night, so they served a pre-fixe menu and paired each of the four courses with half a glass of wine.

Appetizer was a "French take on a Russian salad--" a root vegetable mix (Jay's had tuna) that was wonderful. Soup was butternut squash for me (I keep eating squash soup, because it seems like I should love it, but I'm just not crazy about it. I ate half), spicy lentil with ham for Jay (he loved it). Main course was chicken in tomato sauce with farro (some kind of grain) for Jay and potatoes au gratin with artichokes and bread crumbs for me (amazing). They paired mine with a little arugula salad and I could have eaten two entire plates. The cheese course was the part neither of us were crazy about--it was really strong bleu cheese, which almost activated Jay's gag reflex. There were also candied hazelnuts and pear puree, which redeemed the course. All in all, it was fabulous and we can't wait to go back.

When we got home, we had champagne and took this self-portrait.

Dad's Pesto

This week we have been enjoying Dad Caissie's pesto, made from the copious amounts of basil in his garden. Wednesday, Jay made tortellini with onions, peas, green beans, and broccoli and tossed everything with the pesto. It was a really satisfying dinner, particularly since I'd come off of an entire day of giving tests and answering "oh my gosh I'm going to fail help me" questions.

Today I made mozzarella, cucumber, and red onion sandwiches and used the pesto as a spread. I like pesto in pasta but I love it on sandwiches. I served that with leftover vegetable soup from the night before. Thanks for the pesto, Dad. It's delicious.

The vegetable soup was really good this time. My veggie soups are hit or miss, so I'm recording this one for posterity.

Carb-loaded veggie soup

2 medium russet potatoes, diced
1 large carrot, sliced
2 leeks, chopped (white parts only)
large handful of split peas
10 cups veggie broth (I use water and bouillon, it's cheaper)
2 pinches dill weed
1 pinch thyme
3/4 can chickpeas
1 cup alphabet pasta, cooked

Combine everything put the last two ingredients in a crock pot. Cook on high for 5 hours. Add chickpeas, cook 1 more hour. Add pasta. Add salt and pepper to taste.

This makes a really leeky soup, which I love. If you're not a huge fan of leeks, leave one of them out (but that's a mistake if you ask me). Most people might pick potatoes OR pasta, but I say don't skimp on the good stuff. Plus, you can practice your spelling if you use alphabets. The secret of a really good veggie soup, I think, is the handful of split peas. They thicken the soup and give the broth a nice flavor. Normally I might add minced garlic and definitely a chopped celery stalk (I didn't have one). You can also sub cannellini for the chickpeas, or maybe even navy beans, but I think the chickpeas were really good this time, and they hold together better than cannellini.

Farmers' Market

One of my favorite things to do on Saturday mornings is to walk to the Waltham Farmers' Market. I started doing it last summer and have hardly missed a week since. It always seems like a good idea to walk--save the environment! get exercise!--until I want to buy a watermelon or a sack of potatoes. Then the mile back seems impossible. Once last year, I walked to the market, saw the watermelons, walked back to my house and got the car.

It's been meager pickings at the market for most of the season--mostly lettuces and herbs. But this week, it was a veritable cornucopia of vegetables. I may have gone a little overboard, but hey, it was still less than $20. The bags were cutting painfully into my hands on the way home, but I made it.This week, I bought green beans, cucumbers, green peppers, a zucchini, a kousa squash (I have no idea what that is, but I'm sure it will be delicious stuffed with cheese), some wonderfully mild red onions (sadly, you can only buy those by the bunch. I never know what to do with so many onions), broccoli, blueberries, and the first corn of the season. There were also chocolate chip cookies that didn't make it into the picture--they somehow jumped off the table and landed in my stomach before I could find the camera. I've managed to resist the siren call of Big Sky Bakery so far this year--seriously, $6 for a loaf of bread?!--but a small cookie stand appeared this week, and the cookies were looking so forlorn, I just had to buy some.

The challenge is always in eating all of my purchases. I tend to be overly optimistic when considering our weekly menus. Last week I pulled several packages of lettuce out of the fridge that had achieved a jelly-like consistency. This week I'm determined that we're going to eat all of this stuff. So far I've made a pasta salad and a chopped salad. I'm going to stuff the zucchini and squash and serve it with the corn at some point this week. That will leave just the blueberries and the green beans, which I'm hoping we can finish off before we leave for the Cape on Friday.

"Bullets and Barbeque"

Last night we hosted a murder mystery dinner party. This was the first time I've ever improvised recipes, and they turned out okay. Our menu included ribs for the meaties, red beans and rice, stuffed peppers and asparagus.

Red beans and rice:
I modified this recipe. I used canned beans (2 cans) and took all the meat out, including the Worcestershire sauce (which usually isn't vegetarian). We didn't have celery, or I would have used that. I also was too lazy to cook it for 2-3 hours, so I just added a cup of veggie broth and let it reduce down to a nice sauce. We mixed it with the cooked rice instead of spooning it over the top. The original recipe:

• 1 pound red kidney beans, dry
• 1 large onion, chopped
• 1 bell pepper, chopped
• 5 ribs celery, chopped
• As much garlic as you like, minced (I like lots, 5 or 6 cloves)
• 1 large smoked ham hock, 3/4 pound of Creole-style pickle meat (pickled pork), or 3/4 lb. smoked ham, diced, for seasoning
• 1 to 1-1/2 pounds mild or hot smoked sausage or andouille, sliced on the bias
• 1/2 to 1 tsp. dried thyme leaves, crushed
• 1 or 2 bay leaves
• As many dashes Crystal hot sauce or Tabasco as you like, to taste
• A few dashes Worcestershire sauce
• Creole seasoning blend, to taste; OR,
  • red pepper and black pepper to taste
• Salt to taste

The peppers were a real experiment. They were good, but I would have changed a few things. I used:

• 6 red peppers, halved and scooped
• 1 can of artichoke hearts, chopped
• 1 onion, chopped
• Several handfuls of baby carrots, chopped
• 1 small zucchini, cut into small pieces
• Mexican cheese
• Plain bread crumbs
• Salt and pepper
• Cayenne pepper
• Parsley
• Garlic

I sauteed the garlic, onions, and carrots until softened, then added the zucchini. After the zucchini softened, I added the artichoke hearts for a minute until they were slightly browned. Add the salt, pepper, and cayenne (don't overdo this or you'll regret it). Stuff the peppers and top with cheese, then breadcrumbs and a sprinkle of parsley. Bake at 350 for an hour in an oiled baking dish.

If I do this again, I'll mix the cheese in with the vegetables. By putting the cheese on top and the breadcrumbs over it, it made the cheese crusty. I like hot melty cheese better, and this didn't have any.

Dessert was J.P. Licks ice cream with hot fudge, caramel, and whipped cream.

For entertainment, we did a murder mystery called "Bullets and Barbeque." Peter was hilarious as Juan Bandito, the meanest Mexican bandit in Drygulch. Candice was a close-runner up as Sally Forth, the Sheriff's mail-order bride with a mysterious mutating accent. Fritz was Rowdy Azell, a sweet-talking gambler and Ricki was Bibi Gunn, lady of the night. Jay and I rounded the group out as the town's drunk doctor and Miss Patience, the innocent schoolteacher. It was lots of fun and a lot better than watching Peter murder "Hit Me With Your Best Shot" on Guitar Hero.